The item, as I knew from having read it more than once on the way to Minneapolis here, ran:
FORMER MINNEAPOLISAN LOST AT SEA
Jumps From Pacific Liner Into Ocean
(Radio Despatch to Frisco
Blade, from Australian-bound
Liner, “Southern Cross.”)
October 19: Jack Smith, known to be last from Minneapolis, Minnesota, committed suicide today by jumping into the ocean from the stern of the Southern Cross just near nightfall, on its second night out from San Francisco. The vessel was stopped in mid-ocean, and boats were put out, but darkness prevented any rescue, even if such had been possible in the slightly rough seas then arising. The man Smith had been booked, via 3rd class, from San Francisco to Sydney, Australia. Fellow travelers in the 3rd class reported the man to have been very silent and morose, and he had also told his cabin steward that he had nothing worth living for. The only clue to his identity was his statement to his steward that he had worked in Minneapolis, and was en route to visit his only relative, a sister in Australia. That, and a small cheap silver horseshoe pin he wore in his tie. He was about 52 years of age.
The man facing me looked up. Shoving back the clipping wonderingly to me. “The horseshoe pin—” he began.
“All of this brief story,” I said, replacing the clipping in my pocket, “certified to me that the fellow who jumped into the ocean was Hetchel. I rather fancy he gave in the name ‘Jack Smith’ into the passenger lists with some faint idea that I might determine to go ahead with what he thought was that ‘criminal undertaking’—might get nabbed—and might involve him as ‘accessory before the fact.’ And so he promptly dropped the name of Alonzo Hetchel, in case police-radioed messages were later sent to the vessel. But it was the horseshoe pin that confirmed his being Hetchel. For I had given it to him for luck—when he left. Something I’d picked up on the sidewalk weeks before—it wasn’t pawnable for even two bits—but I’d kept it for luck. And since he’d given me a lot of stuff—about myself—I had passed the pin on to him. And then—this item. I suppose the poor devil suddenly thought, on board ship there, ‘Oh, what’s the use of anything’—and slipped into the briny. Anyway, Givney, the one dangerous link—in any plan of mine to come back and rob my own home—was broken. And then and there, Givney, I decided I would sneak back home here by plane—steal back those diamonds—and, most particularly, the legal deeds to them that I have given Laur—that is, Mrs. King—and then fly surreptitiously back to Frisco—and then wire that I was coming home by train. And start back home again. Lots of travelling—yes. But worth it. Once home, I’d express deep sorrow about Mrs. King’s losses—sure!—but in the meantime I would have placed those stones with the proper parties in Frisco, and, back here in Minny again—officially this time!—would be getting back into the booking game with the hundred thousand capital—and soon be on my feet again. And, eventually, restoring to Mrs. King the full equivalent, in jewels, of her stolen ones. And so, Givney, last night—48 hours after I’d read that item—I despatched an ordinary letter to Mrs. King—to place me definitely there in Frisco up to that moment—and took the plane. And landed here this morning—where I put in the whole earlier half-day going out to, respectively, Stillwater—and Dayton—and mailing two letters, special delivery, one typewritten in German—on a red ribbon of an L. C. Smith machine!—and one typewritten in Polish, on the black ribbon of an Underwood machine! Yes. And those two letters, Givney, cost me $10. For they were carefully created for me by an educated old tramp whom I frequently met in a park in Frisco, and who was living in hopes of getting up into Canada somehow to see his married daughter. I never knew his right name, for I always called him ‘The Prof.’ For he’d been once, it seems, a professor of languages. Knew all the foreign languages, bar none. And booze had gotten him all the way down. And I promised him ten juicy dollars if he would fabricate two letters for me—according to certain copy I would give him—as practical jokes, I told him—one to be in. German, and written in the exact linguistic style of a certain sheet of paper I would give him—and the other to be in Polish, of the same style as another sheet of paper. And, I assured him, I would expect him also to copy his productions for me on the machines corresponding to the typewriting in the sample sheets—which machines were available to us in any of the typewriter companies there in Frisco. All of which, Givney, he did—and, so I am certain from what has since transpired, conscientiously and perfectly. And, with the precious $10 I gave him, he blew towards Canada. Poor old Prof! But here, Givney, is the original copy, which I had translated—transmogrified—and typed—for my Rozalda and my Otto.” And I withdrew from my breast pocket that pencil-written manila sheet that I had prepared for the old boy in Frisco who had translated its two versions for me on the morning I had finally decided to follow Hetchel’s plan. And I tossed it over to my one-man audience. Waiting patiently while he read it with manifest interest. As he should have, since it ran:
My Darling {Rozalda/Otto}
There is much trouble afoot. All wires from your place—and my place—are being listened in on. So make no telephone calls to me—whatever you do. The traitor in the case appears to be this {man Otto/woman Rozalda} who works there with you. So say nothing to {him/her} whatever you do. And send no letters to me, much less wires. But meet me WITHOUT FAIL at 10:30 o’clock tonight—(October 22nd)—at the identical place where last we met in this town. Do not fail me, my {Rozalda/Otto} whatever you do—for unless you come tonight you will never learn of facts which otherwise, unless I show you how to counteract them, may result in your discharge, your arrest, and maybe your life.
Your own
T/G
Again, beware. And do not betray by the slightest move, to this {man Otto/woman Rozalda} that you have received such a message as I have had to send. Particularly if {he/she} receives a special delivery, around the time of this one. For that will indicate most certainly that {he/she} is the guilty one. Make no telephone call to me whatever you do—or all IS lost.
In God’s name {R/O} be at the spot at the exact hour I give. I rely on you.
My one-man audience read the manila sheet through, evidently understanding that it served duplexly as copy for two letters. And looked up. Shoving it gingerly back. “Well,” was his only comment, “you sure sewed your Dutchman’s—and your Polack girl’s—lips.” He paused, thinking. “And so,” he went on, “after having mailed ’em—and it musta taken you a good half a day all right to go out to Stillwater—and then to Dayton—you done—what?”
“Marked time,” I told him truthfully, “in the new Franklin D. Roosevelt Park—as far from the center of Minneapolis as I could get—lest somebody recognize me. And read the late developments—in the Jemimah Cobb—execution! And finally, only when it got dusk, came out here. Getting here about 7 o’clock. And I sat in that deserted building-materials shack—down the street. If I’d figured my train schedules right, to both Stillwater and Dayton—either via steam or via the electric suburban lines—Rozalda, fulfilling her end of that critical ‘date’ for 10:30 in Dayton—and lingering at least a half hour fruitlessly waiting—could not possibly land back here on Hobury Heights till 1 in the morning. While Otto, doing the identical things in Stillwater, could not get back here till 1:30 at least. And both ought to be getting out of here by—But to make a long story short, Givney, at 8:15 o’clock Rozalda rushed out of the house here—consulting her wrist watch every time she passed a lamppost. Which meant—making a train! And at 8:45 out came Otto—he with an overnight bag!—Otto evidently hoped that his sweetie might be going to have the entire night off—and off he went, too. The streetcar up there gobbling him up as it had Rozalda 30 minutes before. And now the house was entirely dark. Both my servants had disobeyed my and Mrs. King’s orders.
“So up the street I walked, Givney. And let myself into my own house with not my own—but Hetchel’s—key. Which fitted most perfectly. And as I came up th
e old familiar stairs, and hung up my things on the rack there, I was thinking that I was like nothing else than a jock who was riding a race under silks other than his own stable. For I was coming into my own house—rather, Mrs. King’s, in view of the fact that it’s entirely in her name—as an intruder. And then—I heard fumbling at the sill—saw you silhouetted against the shade—making burglarious entry here into my home—and, as well you know, I nabbed you with my gun as you clambered into the room. But the minute, Givney, that your eyes fastened on that safe over there—and I took a hasty look too—and saw a steel door twice as big as the one I knew to be there—and a mess of gleaming dials—and bright new gold and red paint letters—I knew I was sunk—that Laurel had put in a new vault since Hetchel’s departure—and that not in a thousand years did I have the ghost of a show to get in by any ‘knob knocking’—much less whirling those great dials around.
“And then, Givney,” I finished, “when you told me your strange story—about your magic eardrums—I saw that my plan had been saved—by an expert! Now do you see why I need you?”
And I leaned back, and mopped my forehead. For I had talked to him for a considerable length of time.
And it looked as though I had talked in vain!
For his answer finally came.
“Yes,” he said, “I see why you need me all right. And also—why you ain’t going to get me! For my answer is, King—that I ain’t going to open that safe!”
CHAPTER XXIII
Last Card!
I looked at him aghast. For I had considered that the facts I had given him—plus my assurances of a profitable track job for him—had won him over.
“Well, why—why in the face of all I’ve told you,” I expostulated, “won’t you play ball?”
“Because,” he said stubbornly, “you ain’t told me everything.”
And he closed his lips in a thin hard line that was that of a man whose feelings were hurt.
“What—what do you mean?” I queried.
“I mean,” he retorted, “that you ain’t played square with me; that there’s still something you ain’t told—something concerning the hangin’ of that nigger wench in London.”
“What on earth,” I blustered, “makes you think that?”
“Because,” he said triumphantly, “when you told about sitting in Franklin Roosevelt Park there, and reading the late afternoon papers—with the new development in that there case—you suddently looked a million years old. No foolin’! For ten seconds there, King, you actually looked 100 years older than you prob’ly are. I—I never seen anything like it. An’—an’ that meant somethin’.”
I stared back at him. He certainly didn’t need, in his tussle with life, to depend on observations of subconscious actions! He was just plain downright shrewd, that’s all; and used his two eyes! Obviously, he was curious, merely, about what he was quite certain I was holding back; but now I found myself wondering whether an appeal—an appeal to his sense of decency where a woman was concerned—might bring him over the rest of the way—and speedily.
In short, should I play my last card?
If I did, he would know something for the rest of his life that preferably he ought not to know. But, again, he knew so much about me right now—that he might just as well know a little more! And anyway, if I could get him to do this thing I wanted—and if he could do it—two ifs, yes!—then it would mean that Jemimah Cobb would never make that revelation on the gallows. In which case, the facts I would be giving to him now would—should he ever confide them to any living person—be, so far as his auditor or auditors went, the purest fantasy, the wildest moonshine.
My decision was made in an instant.
“Well, Givney,” I said slowly, “there is one more thing that I haven’t told you. And it is, yes, about that black murderess due to hang there in London—in about 3 hours from now. And the reason I looked perturbed was because, Givney, the white American whose name she is going to reveal is—myself!”
“The—the hell you say!” he retorted, plainly dumfounded. And then I saw a look of supreme scorn rising slowly on his round face.
“But don’t get superior,” I warned him. “I’m no degenerate—as perhaps you think. I tumbled across her threshold, years ago, ill—and was half out of my head when she married me.”
He stared at me. “We-ell—I might accep’ that—but damned if I think anybody else ever will. Including the woman you married!”
I winced at that.
“I wouldn’t hurt her for the world,” was all I said.
“Well it sure looks,” he commented dryly, “that she’s gonna get hurt now—an’ plenty!”
“Not,” I said calmly, “if I get that jewelry.”
“Not?” he echoed. “What c’n you do—jew’lry or no jew’lry—to stop that hangin’ in London?”
Now again I thought hard. Everything, absolutely everything, depended now on his willingness to play ball. If he didn’t—all was lost anyway! And if he did, the London affair would be turned before ever he might get a chance to talk—and ‘Horses’—well, ‘Horses’ would be out of England—and out of danger himself.
And so I told him, with no qualms, my entire plans.
CHAPTER XXIV
The Vial
“In the first place, Givney,” I said, “there’s an emerald ring in there amongst Laurel’s jewelry—a ring that’s easily worth $2500 cash—and on which I can obtain $1000 cash in less than 30 minutes from now. And—”
“Oh yeah? How?”
“How? From a rich old codger who lives in Minneapolis—at least used to—on the fringe of the downtown section, and directly between here and downtown—and who collects emeralds avidly. Emeralds only. And never asks questions—I regret to say! This emerald I speak of is a beauty—and of a rare shape, for it’s triangular. This old man always keeps plenty of money on his premises. Distrusts banks. Eccentric. Has two husky servants—yet nary a telephone! And, do I ever call there—with that emerald—he’ll buy it in a minute. And will forget, moreover, that Mortimer King, Esquire, ever called there. Naturally!”
He nodded, uncomprehendingly.
“Well go ahead with the plan,” he ordered. “And you can get a thousand bucks pronto. All right. So then what?”
“Then what? I can wire that thousand dollars across to London in thirty minutes. From the downtown cable office of the Postal-Union. Or—don’t you know that?”
“Of course I know that. Ain’t I seen the two big signs in their window that says, one of ’em, ‘Open All Night,’ and the other that money c’n now be shot acrost the ocean, day or night, in a half hour—I think it says, ‘Counter to Foreign Doorstep—in 30 Minutes.’ But who the hell will you wire this money to? Jemimah Cobb?” He was waxing sarcastic there.
“No, not Jemimah Cobb,” I said harshly. “To that fellow ‘Horses’—to whom I referred a while back. Together with full instructions—via transatlantic telephone—but couched in the old private lingo we once used together on the tracks.” I hated to go on divulging facts about ‘Horses’—but divulge, it seems, I must tonight! “And ‘Horses,’ Givney, happens to be a Negro. No, I didn’t tell you that when I first mentioned him. Nor even that he’s an ex-actor. But a consummate actor, Givney. And possesses the nerve and gall of the devil—of 20 devils. Why, one day on the tracks—but skip it! Anyway, he lives in Low Holloway—within a short mile of Pentonville Prison. He’s a man who never gets home till dawn—but dawn always and invariably sees him coming in. So much so, Givney, that one man we both once mutually knew called him ‘Milkwagon.’ While still another called him ‘The Clock’! And it’s for that exact reason that all evening, up till now, I couldn’t have done anything through ‘Horses’—or tried anything through ‘Horses’—had I wanted to. But now, at last, Givney, dawn is just about to break in London. And, in 30 minutes or so, ‘Horses’ will be coming home. And,
Givney, ‘Horses’ has for years carried on his watchchain—and does yet today, for I jokingly asked him about it when I talked to him a few days back—‘Horses,’” I repeated, “has for years carried on his watchchain a tiny, almost microscopic, glass vial—no bigger than a tack—filled with hydrocyanic acid.”
“What the hell is—is that?”
“It’s an acid that, Givney, if you bit into that tiny vial with your teeth—and it even spilled on your tongue—you’d be dead in 5 seconds.”
“Wowie! Why does he carry it?”
“Because he’s had a fear, for years, of being caught in a burning train wreck—or a burning house—or a burning plane wreck. A sort of bug idea, that’s all.”
“I get it now,” he said. “And you figure that this guy, for the thousand bucks he needs bad—and no doubt a promise of another thousand from ‘Square-Shooter’ King—” I nodded confirmation of his words, “—would pass the poison to Cobb, who—but listen—he couldn’t never, black though he is, get in to see her—and second, she wouldn’t be hep, if he did, what he had in his mitt for her; and third, she wouldn’t have the guts to—listen—how is all this goin’ to be accomplished?”
The Man with the Magic Eardrums Page 21
